Three's Company
by timelucked
Summary: The Doctor didn't know asking Amy Pond what she wanted to do today would lead to the impending collapse of the universe. I think it's about time the Three New Who Doctors got a special all on their own. 9, 10, 11, and gang sort out a major mess.
1. Chapter 1

_And what better way to start than by jumping into the action!_

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><p>"Amelia Pond," the Doctor clapped his hands together, rubbing friction between his warm palms. He broke into a madman's grin, face rent with its maniacal nature. Taking the ramp two twirls at a time, Amy watched as his fingers danced and waved intricate patterns into the air, whirling round and round with a flourish only he possessed; one that found a smile tracing out a fond design against her creamy skin. She shook her head at his antics, crossing her arms over her flannel-clad chest as he made his merry way around his console. Flicking switches and flapping knobs, he asked her, "What <em>shall <em>we do today?"

Before Amy could speak however - finger poised and ready to answer - a sickening smell filled the TARDIS.

A pop crackled and electricity fizzled in the air, a palpably heady mixture of sulfur and ozone smog ghosting across the bright expanse of the blinking console room. The Doctor, caught in the fire of the unknown spark, yelped and coughed, waving his arms wildly about in an effort to diffuse the thin veil of smoke surrounding him. The cloister bell sounded, its mighty gong lost to his racking splutters. The TARDIS chimed fervently again, in an attempt to gather his attention towards the perceived threat to no avail. He hacked into his hand, his eyes tearing from the rotten smell. He gave quick thanks to the evolution of his race for the respiratory bypass, which helped him in this particular scenario, before more of the vile stank filled his nostrils and his suffocated lungs were thrown under the burning sensation of the gas.

From her perch, Amy's eyes widened. Despite the shroud of gray haze covering the mid-level of the ground floor, a stoic shadow caught her crafty eyes as it blinked into existence from the center of the spark. Blinking, her mouth fell agape, bewildered at the image before her. That couldn't be – _shouldn't be _– possible. Right?

The Doctor sprinted over to her, his arm covering the lower half of his face as he ran like a streaking blur from the noxious fumes.

"Amy, Amy, are you hurt, Amy – Amy!" he cried out with urgency, floundering about her body with the sonic, his arms flapping uselessly by his sides like a flustered mother hen, scrutinizing and clucking around every inch of her.

Clearing her throat, Amy raised a slender finger upwards in an almost lazy gesture, her hand flopping back. Her eyes locked on a target straight ahead, her brow knit as she tried to form a way to begin this.

She went the way she knew best; straightforward.

"Doctor," she said his name in the guttural accent she had never lost – so Scottish, forever and always this Amelia Pond, the little girl in the English village. She licked her lips, extending her hip as she rested a hand atop it. "Who's tha'?"

With a winded chuckle, the Doctor breathed out a, "Who's who?" cracking a smile and pivoting on his heel to look at what held his companion's interest.

His smile faltered, slipping as his hand did, trailing an arc through the air with slow, heavy limbs, the green light of his sonic fading as his finger left the control. The sound of silence buzzed louder than his tool. Standing amidst the dissipating smoke was a man the Doctor thought he would never see again – _could_ never see again. A face he only saw in the mirror on those sleepless weeks when delusions fought for dominance over the rational functions of his brain and won.

Amy watched as a figure swathed in dark hues brushed dust off himself, taking a deep pull of clean air as the TARDIS cleansed itself, dispersing the airborne pathogens and sucking the toxins into special filters and pockets. She appraised him and noted that the man wore leather as worn and rough as his face, dark burgundy v-neck that fit close to his body snugly, accentuating the ridges of muscle beneath the thin fabric, underneath the jacket. Large hands stuck out from the jacket that suited him like a knight to armor. His short-cropped hair clung close to his head, a patch of hair as dark as his brooding eyes were clear. She looked upon his eyes next and was taken aback by the startling quality, as piercing and striking as cut-diamond, they glanced about the TARDIS as a snarl curled his upper lip in obvious discontent. Dark denim covered his lower half and scuffed loafers looking weary from use seemed to mark this man for a runner, and quite a good one at that. With his physique she had no doubt this man could complete a marathon – or twelve. He took another displeased sniff and Amy tried to stifle her giggle as she noticed his big ears and accompanying nose, not given much time to reflect on these when another snap cracked the air.

Coughing and waving a hand in front of his face, a new man stood a distance away from the other, on the opposite side of the room; his eyes squinted against the slighter smoke that enveloped him in a gauzy mist. Amy was pleased that this go-around went much less violently, an easier transition, and was even more pleased upon viewing the unexplained visitor.

"Doctor," she trilled excitedly, bobbing her head appreciatively as the man blinked in rapid succession, whirling around with wide eyes, his coat skirting and fanned out around him. "Who's _tha'_?"

Mouth parched and suddenly dryer than his aching lungs, the Doctor had finally found a moment when he was at a complete and total loss. Thousands of possibilities rushed by in his head – marking the tally up to 1,342 of ways of why this incident could be very not good – none of them able to take shape as they bombarded each other like the crashing of waves against rocky beach.

Ignoring him regardless, never having the intention to listen to his prattle in the first place, Amy drank in an eyeful of this delicious new man before her. Much like the previous man, he wore a coat that seemed to mark him for who he was – an innate feeling Amy knew to be correct. The dusty trench was donned like a fond friend and an even closer ally around the slim shoulders of this newcomer. He wore a form-fitting suit that hugged his features in an intimate embrace, a blue oxford beneath a chestnut brown jacket, a swirly-patterned tie and matching slacks to boot. His trousers were fine pressed and peeking out to say hello from beneath them were the man's dirty old white trainers, off-setting the rest of the ensemble, but complimenting the man all the same. Quite unlike the leathery man beside him, this one had plumes of outrageous hair. Amy's hand reached out from no accord of her own as the fluffy mass called to her, as brown and scrumptious as the Doctor's own hair beside her. But this man, whose spiky hair that hung a fringe over his brow and trailed across the rim of thick-wired spectacles, seemed older than her Doctor.

Staring out around the TARDIS in obvious shock, he wheeled around numerous amount of times before settling on his previous position, legs wide-spread, his Adam's apple bobbing as he tried to grasp the enormous entirety of the situation.

Amy wanted to walk over and – among many things, though to keep her propriety as a married woman, she simply wanted to – console him. She remembered her first time on the TARDIS well.

"At least you're not in your nightie," she wanted to say with a laugh, break the tangible tension in the room.

Swaying in her spot though, she glimpsed the stricken form of the Doctor as he stared with horror at the sight of these two men. Blinking in confusion, Amy leant closer to him and whispered, "So, Doctor, who are these guys?"

He tried to open his mouth to speak, to answer, to do anything besides think of the _immense, _catastrophicdanger this posed – the collapse of the galaxy, pock-marking a fissure in this solar system double the size of Belgium, what with the additional man on board. It was bad enough when there was only one other to deal with, now he had two and this was so very, very not good. He seemed to have lost motor function in his jaw as his brain refused to send the receptive message to the proper nerve endings, instead having his hand spasm around its hold on his screwdriver. Amy's lips rolled in on themselves, her brow rising to her hairline as he refused to speak. She was about to punctuate a slow, "Okay," but lost the chance as the gruff man spoke up.

"So who are you then?" his thick accent reminded Amy of the rare times government representatives from up in Yorkshire came to trouble the people of Leadworth with tax collections and other useless government trifles she hadn't paid the slightest bit of attention to. The leathery man knocked his head over to the stranger in the long coat.

The man's face contorted, shifting planes of facial musculature reconstructing before her eyes as he tried to articulate a proper sentence, most of his words spilling out in, "Ehms," and "Wells," and multiple, "Uhs," fitted in. His scuttling fingers kept prancing lightly across his brow, never settling on one place and having difficulty talking to this man. From the clear recognition in his voice and stance, Amy knew that long coat knew leather, but that the relationship wasn't mutual. She questioned that from where she stood, glancing over periodically and noting that the Doctor had yet to move anything more than his spasmodic fingers. He ended up placing his scrambling fingers over his right side burn and scratching the patch as if for comfort, or some grip to hold onto.

Amy saw the flicker of realization flash in the cold eyes of the man, softening his features for a moment of vulnerability, before returning with an even harder edge. He snorted, his eyes catching an inner fire that seemed to spit venom as harsh as his words.

"Huh. So this is who I am, then? I turn into a bloody_ pretty_ boy," he bit out a self-depreciating laugh, the sound making Amy cringe. It was rough and brutal and completely self-inflicted, probably the worst part to witness. He chuckled in the same demeaning way, shaking his head at the ill fortune of it all. "Oh and I bet Rose just _loved_ that, didn't she? Ate that right up."

The name caught a spark of recognition in the back of Amy's mind, but it was the man in the trench that stole away her thoughts.

Upon hearing the words, the man seemed to have broken, his face dropped of all its carefully crafted and placed guards. The name was like kryptonite, coursing, shooting its poisonous, green venom and injecting it into his veins, coiling around in his blood stream as his empty hearts pumped the poison faster. Only this venom was pink and yellow and bright and luminescent. All the things he missed in the world, in the universe far, far away.

The leathery man turned away in time, grunting low in his throat once more, but it wouldn't have mattered anyway, nothing could school the man in the trench's expression.

For too long, he had been running. Running, always running; running from time, running from punishment, running from songs, and running from that name. For too long and too hard, he had run. Then came the time where he was forced to stop, witness all over the pain of losing those – losing one – dear. It had only been just recently that he had stepped off that beach and away from her, to walk alone and carry out a task that would break his hearts in the end as always. To lose two precious people in one day, after watching the rest saunter away, just as his own fate bespoke of. That was his curse, he knew - his bane and lot in life - to forever carry out the duties and mete out the punishment the universe deemed unto him.

His hearts had shattered so many times because of it; they lay broken and wheezing, barely beating a stifled pulse in his chest. The cavity there was just that. Not a scientific word, but a dense hole that seemed to swallow him whole from the inside and out. Like a black hole on a distant, impossible, planet.

It was like it was only yesterday that he had watched that mirror of himself, the part courageous and _human_ enough to, love her. He couldn't stomach the sight, not when he hadn't the privilege to do it himself. It was selfish, but it felt justified in the face of what he had given up and what he was also about to. He turned and walked away as briskly as he could, ever the coward, even from the days when he donned leather and a sour countenance. Now that face followed him everywhere, haunting him in his sleepless nights, seeing that smile catch light behind every close of his eyelids. Inhaling her intoxicating scent past every jasmine flower shop, seeing that coupled with the flower of her namesake. Taunting him, mocking him, the same way as Time did – just as it always had. And when he had tried to harness Time unto himself, It had betrayed him. Just as he had his people. It only seemed befitting for It to do so, take away his victory.

But there was no victory in the blood of an innocent woman. There was no glory, no honor, in being the last and claiming a self-prophesized victory.

Still though, to hear that name escape so easily, to be scoffed at as it was, sent a razored barb through the remnants of his clamoring hearts. Had life really been so simple back then, where his only troubles were pretty boys named Adam or Ricky - and a Slitheen named Blon Fel-Fotch? Looking at his brooding past, as he grimaced and sneered at the new TARDIS décor, he only wished he could return to those times. Or at least to the time when he was just the New New Doctor on his way to a New New Earth with the same and marvelous, old Rose Tyler.

The haunted look Amy saw in the man's eyes was all too familiar. She saw it in the Doctor's eyes often when he thought no one was around to see him. All those lonely nights where he would sneak into the console room, flip buttons and tweak levers and twiddle with fiddly-bits, carrying the saddest of eyes, eyes that could drown entire planets in his sorrow. A sorrow he had never shared, only ever evaded, with her, despite the constant prodding. She could tell that the man before her was the same. He looked as if he had the weight of countless worlds on his shoulders and his back bowed at the pressure – at the grief. She wanted to walk over to him, to pat his shoulder and try to lift some of that weight, feeling an odd sort of connection with him, the same way she had the moment she had met the Doctor. There was a certain pull about him, like he radiated with a central magnetism that brought people closer.

The leathery man cut her off before she could even begin her first step.

"An' you_, baby-face_," Amy whipped her head around to see the stock-stilled Doctor snap his eyes over to the man, the fractional movement he still seemed capable of doing. "Wha' gives then, eh - I assume this is your handiwork. An' what's so wrong about lookin' your age? Why is it that you go about gettin' yourself younger?" he hmmphed and crossed his arms over his broad chest, shrugging his shoulders. "I see nothin' wrong with looking your age. Especially seein' as I apparently get stupider with it."

The dusty man in the trench brought himself back from the deadness of his daze, choking on words and suffocating, drowning, in his despair at that comment.

"_Well,_" he began, wincing as he rubbed the back of his neck. "I mean, you say that now, but trust me when I tell you you do _not_ want to be looking your age. Been there done that, not very fun to be honest, kind of a bore – e_specially_ when the whole of humanity rests on 900 years worth of aged shoulders, isn't that right?" he turned to address the Doctor, a brief smile flickering across his features.

Clearing his throat a few times, the Doctor made to answer, but as per recently, was caught off by his brusquer past self.

"And another thing," he glared around, whisking his head this way and that. "What've you done to the TARDIS? It's gone an' changed. Was it you?"

He pointed the finger at the man in the trench coat to Amy's bewilderment who simply raised his hands up quickly by his head, his eyes wide, and mouth a thin line as he sought to placate the angry, leather man. He turned his down-tilted glare towards the Doctor, quirking his lips as if he knew he was the one all along.

"So you're to blame then, I might've known. Goin' an' changin' the theme - look at her! She was great when I had 'er, an' now look," he said scornfully, belying such entreatment with a soft touch against one of the coral ruts, rubbing his fingers into the rough texture like a lover's caress, massaging the machine with expert fingers. His face jumped into an eye-creasing grin as the TARDIS hummed happy and warm beneath his touch, like she missed this stranger man dearly. He gave another fond pat and rounded back on the Doctor, his gaze penetrating and making the man flinch instinctually.

Amy chuckled awkwardly. "Um," two sets of eyes turned to her as if they had just noticed her presence. One pair regarded her curiously, a glimmer of something pressing against the backs of his irises sending shots of electricity right through him to his very core. He whipped his gaze to the Doctor, pain brimming and ringing his eyes red as a realization seemed to dawn on him the moment he looked at Amy, the young ginger full of fire and spunk. So much like the one before her…

The other set seemed to tighten around the piercing blue edges. Amy took a step back, unsettled by the eyes that bore hard and pressing into hers, as if simmering by her presence alone.

"When you say you had her," she took a cautious step forward. "Wha' exactly do you mean by that?"

The gruff man straightened up, his expression shifting as something tugged at the back of his mind.

"But more to the point," he blatantly ignored her question and substituted it for one of his own, looking around and for all the world like a dog that had heard the high pitch of a whistle only he could hear. "Where's Rose gone off to?"

There went that name again. Amy rolled her eyes, this was ridiculous - how many more times would she have to see that poor fluffy-haired man flinch at the name of a flower.

"Who?" Amy bit out sharper than she had intended, aggravated by the unresponsiveness of the Doctor and the surprisingly unusual nature of this scenario.

Time seemed to have stopped, a great feat in an already time-locked ship. The room went deathly silent and Amy could feel the crackling energy lying dormant and in wait just beneath the surface. It was that same energy that brought these men here.

"Who?" the leather man asked with a voice so quiet, it seemed fatal just listening to. "_Who?"_ he repeated, driving deeper the wedge in the slim man's heart who remained solid and impassive despite his quivering heartbeats.

The anger this man contained, the sheer magnitude and force behind each stride he took was astounding; nearly blowing her over with the gushing, crackling aura surrounding him. It was as if his anger had become sentient, raging and roaring like the epicenter of a crashing wave, the effects spilling over and buffeting her in its – his – sheer might. He was like a storm, all rage and fired movements, his body jostling as he tried to remain in control of himself, despite the spinning anger within. But this storm had no calm. And this storm was quickly approaching her. If Amy didn't move, she knew she would be caught up in this torrential gale of the oncoming storm. Tripping on her heels in her haste to backpedal, the man stepped past her, his hulking figure bearing down on the much slimmer Doctor, his original focus, instead.

"Who the hell is Rose – who the hell is _this_ then? Who the _hell_ have you brought onto _my _TARDIS?" The Doctor, nearly leaping from his skin at the close proximity of his former self, not wanting to touch and create a paradox in the already warring heart of the TARDIS, steadied himself as best he could while keeping as much space as from the man, who seemed uneasily intent on pressing himself as close to himself, as possible. "Now I'll ask again – where – _is_ – _Rose!" _He all but shouted in the Doctor's face, spittle flying as his body jerked against what he hoped not to be true, trying to deny the possibility that Rose wasn't here because of him.

The Doctor opened his mouth, but another voice filled it. A voice that had once belonged to that same but oh so different mouth, once upon a time.

"She left."

Panting heavily, the leather man glowered into the eyes so old in the face so young of the Doctor's. Keeping his eyes trained on those eyes that had once held his own blue, he spat, "What?" but the fire was lacking, burnt out until charred cinders remained.

Amy felt relieved when she saw the man's shoulders sag, hating herself for taking appreciation out of this man's obvious defeat. Then she remembered that rage he placed on the Doctor and found herself at peace with her indifference. Nobody messed with her best friend. And once the man in the trench did his preaching, she was going to do hers. A woman with nails was a much fiercer opponent than a man with his words when concerning Amelia Pond. Four therapists and seven bite marks were proof of that.

The man in the trench coat took a stabilizing gulp, inhaling and exhaling in measured breaths. "She left," he answered again, thankful his voice remained steady. He released another breath and felt the remainder of his hearts leave him with it, fluttering away as frail as if nothing held them down anymore. He had lost all his connections, what else did he have left? Two broken hearts that beat only because they must.

"Wha' d'you mean, 'she left'?" the stoic man tried to keep his posture strict, but his back bent further as the evidence came to him. If Rose had been here, truly stayed with him – any him - and been here, she would have run out by now. At least come to say hello.

Thoughts of what he must have done to scare her off flittered into his mind like the nagging buzz of a bee, stinging at his already insecure sensibilities regarding a one Rose Tyler. Now the fact of the matter was, the blinding truth that stared him in the face – a ginger girl instead of a blonde - he was going to lose her – and he knew it would be his fault. Was to be his fault. Was always going to be his fault.

Shifting in his place, the man stuffed his hands into the large pockets of his coat. He sniffed, pretending it didn't matter, pretending the hurt didn't take the sting of a thousand sharp needles, puncturing his skin with every false word he spoke. "She's gone. I…I let her go."

This raised a flag. The man's brow quirked above his shock of blue eyes, aware of the distinct change in wording. Amy watched as in those clear blue depths, the reflection of understanding pass through them. There was a definite change in the words the fluffy-headed man had said. Diction was everything and the man in leather wasn't about to let this nuance slide.

"You…" he breathed a laugh out his nose, grinning lopsidedly as he stared at the ground, his hand clapping to his side. "You let her go?"

Straightening up, the man nodded, sticking his chin in the air as he studied the man down the line of his nose in open challenge. "I did."

He gave the appearance of being tall, of feeling a pride he currently did not have. A pride he hadn't had in a long time. A pride that had left him the moment Donna had. Had left him the minute Rose, Jack, Mickey, Martha, Jackie, Sarah Jane, and everyone else did. His pride left with them because they were all the good he wasn't – that he no longer had. They were all the good in the world he sought to be. They were the embodiments of everything that had been taken away from him, all the good, while he was left with the bad. With the crazed mind and the lonely hearts and the bloody hands and the dirty soul of a broken man. So he put up the farce, created the pretense of pride.

Which had been the worst move out of any and really, he should have known that.

Amy gasped as suddenly the man in the trench clattered to the floor in a grunting heap. In a flash too quick for her eye to catch, to even begin to register, the leathery man who had appeared right before her was over by the other man in the blink of an eye. He stood over the other's prone body, his chest heaving and fist throbbing, poised just beside his face where he had used the compressed pressure in his muscles to reel a punch so hard into the man, it knocked him off his feet.

"No!" the Doctor cried out, his hand flying outwards to ward off the impending danger this would cause; but it was too late.

The fight had begun as the Cloister bell rang out, like the starting mark of a beginning boxing match. The damage had been done and now the weight of two Belgiums rested on his shoulders. This was so - very, very not good.

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><p><strong>AN: Don't worry, next chapter will bring some more Eleven. After all, this is his ship now, even if it is currently being re-commandeered. **

**Oh and, like how I couldn't not incorporate Rose into this story. Yeah. What can I say, she haunts me as surely as she does Ten. **

**Next chapter: A few new character introductions are made in a completely unconventional - or rather, a very Who-conventional - way and it's time for the Doctor to get a start on this impending doom business. And he may require the service of a very unique friend of his for this. **


	2. Chapter 2

The Doctor flew into action, bounding off his landing and down onto the platform where the other two men continued their scrabble, the heels of their shoes – both worn and dirtied from desperate use – scuffing along the metal grille. The Doctor moved in flurried motions, flitting between the two men who jerked and tumbled and crashed against the floor of the console room. He shouted nonsense words that Amy knew for a fact he made up along the way. Like it mattered, these people wouldn't even understand him even if he was speaking with proper words. So Amy just stood there, shaking her head with the barest of movements, as he prattled on, crossing her arms and simply watching the sight before her.

"NO, NO, YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND," he shouted as he jumped from one side to the other, the sounds of flesh beating into flesh breaking into metal vying for dominance over the grunts and low cadance of the cloister bell. "YOU CAN'T BE TOUCHING EACH OTHER, YOU'LL BLOW A HOLE IN THE ROTORS, THE CENTRAL COLUMN WILL COMBUST, AND WE'LL ALL BE BLASTED INTO THE NEAREST OBLIVION, NAMELY, THE TARDIS' ERUPTION!"

Amy's lips puckered in on themselves as she studied the men. The one in the leather straddled Trench at the hips, his fingers like talons, mottled around the slender neck of the man he sat upon. He pummeled the back of Sideburn's' head into the alien steel of the spaceship, his face a grotesque picture of rage. The look was horrible and rent the man in its inexplicable nature, his fury exacted upon Trench.

Amy pitied the man, looked upon the two fighters as she did her Doctor. All three bore a certain sadness in their eyes, a shared depiction of pain far older than they appeared but it was the beaten man that caught her pity hardest.

He thrashed against the ground, his back arching and smacking right back down on the hard flooring sharply, his face the picture of agony. But it wasn't agony for the wounds so readily supplied. It was an unfathomable pain that dwelled within him. There was an incomprehensible sadness and self-loathing that screwed his eyes shut.

Time froze for Amy, slowed until the scene was moving through a film of water, its depth unimaginable and its strength crushing, thick and submersible. The Doctor leapt in mid-air around the two, continuing his useless babble with a jaw that worked at half the pace. Leather worked Trench until his scowl looked a permanent fixture on his face, a dark contenance that shadowed in the lines of his frowning brow. Sideburns moved slow enough in this frozen elapse of time that Amy could see through to his character. She felt like she knew the man that fought with all his might yet had the face of a man who had given up everything.

She felt like she knew him because Amy had seen this face before. Her eyes captured the Doctor just as time sped back up. The speed sent Amy reeling, her eyes fluttering in her head, but to the three who scrambled on the floor, time seemed to have made no change at all. She swallowed hard and cleared her head, her temple throbbing and her throat dry.

Trench had finally begun holding his own, reeling his arm back at the elbow – as far as the ground let him bend – and pummeling his hands into the leathery hide of the older man. The other half of his body flopped uselessly. On the one hand he fought, yet on the other Amy could still see hints of what he truly wanted.

He wanted this beating, he wanted to be beaten and put down, to be hit on the account of whatever it was he had lost, and Amy already knew what that loss was. Already knew because she had lost it countless times before, had bear witness to such a loss over and over, and each time forgotten. Forgotten but never lost. That was something she would never lose.

The mentioned Rose was to this man – these men, it would seem – as Rory was to her.

Her heart broke and the pieces went out to the man who seemed to welcome death, even if his fists accompanied him.

The Doctor continued his unhelpful trilling ("GET – OFF – HIM – NOW! I can't believe I was this bad of a listen – WHAT PART OF TEMPORAL WAVE ERUPTION ARE YOU LOT NOT UNDERSTANDING? Is my face really just this ignorabl-!") until finally he hopped around too quickly and caught an elbow to the nose.

Leather clad arm met soft, pliable cartilage and the Doctor fell limp to the ground, a single trail of blood oozing from his nostril. Amy's eyes widened but the movement of the two men caught her eye again.

Utilizing Leather's distraction, Trench flipped them around and took matters into his own hands. Leathery man's face registered shock but he stilled for a moment, looking stunned, but not from impact or the change in the pace of the fighting. He looked into the eyes of the other man and saw the pain and hurt. Little did Amy realize just how impacting that was to him.

It didn't seem to matter much, though. Growling, he swatted Sideburn's' hands away from their reach around his neck, and began vying for proper positioning again. It was no use. Trench had seemed to regain his fighting spirit and threw his own fair share of punches, breaking the skin of his knuckles across Leather's cheekbone. Trench tched under his breath and Leather snarled viciously like a mad dog. The two panted heavily, heavily enough to steam before their faces. Amy was so engrossed, she jumped the moment a new voice joined the mix.

Much more subdued, Rory padded into the room, calling out happily, "Amy, we just –" his voice dropped as he came to a staggering halt. "Or, it could wait," his eyes narrowed as he looked upon the scene in confusion. "Um-?"

Amy pressed her lips together and shrugged, not sparing a glance in her husband's direction, she favored keeping her eyes trained to the incredulous sight before her as he did.

He lifted a finger then let it fall loosely. "Um, what?"

Amy lifted an arm from its nestle in the crook of her other in response. She really didn't know what to tell him anyway.

High heels clopped down the corridor followed by a sharp gasp. Amy didn't have to turn to know who it was. There had been only one other person left on the TARDIS unaccounted for, so it had to be her. Though granted, more people seemed to be cropping up at odds and ends. Next thing an elephant – larger than the two brambling ones in the center – would meander in and complete this odd day.

"My, my," River trilled, the corners of her mouth curling and a spark glinting in her eyes. "Three Doctors today? I didn't know it was my birthday!"

Rory's face fell to the throes of confusion as Amy blinked. She jerkily wheeled around to face her _grown_ daughter, eyes narrowed and lips a line as she tried to guess at what she was saying.

"What?"

Realization dawned on her husband's face in a slow spread, as if the knowledge he attained were the butter to his toast but before Amy could question what he had gleaned from this, a slow-starting yell roused their attentions towards the limp Time Lord on the ground.

"AaaaaAAARGH!" the Doctor snapped to his feet like a board, eyes jiggling in their sockets slightly as he rammed into focus. He spun this way and that, his hair flying and slapping himself as he whipped around too quickly for it to catch up. He shook his head out and clapped his hands together, his lips making the same sounds as a motorboat. He grunted a few times and clapped again, orienting himself finally. "Ah, Amy, Rory!" he turned to the two with a great grin. He nodded towards their daughter. "River. Meet me," the Doctor smiled with a point to the man in the trench coat who grabbed at the lapels of the man in leather, jerking him this way and that. "And…" he hesitated, "me."

Amy tried wrapping her mind around the idea, around what he was saying. Rory stood blankly and River tried, vainly, to hide her growing smirk at where her mind was headed.

"And me," the Doctor finished lastly, no need of gesturing to himself. His cool smile dipped as his brow creased in deep v's. He roared, "AND WE ARE ALL _MINUTES_ AWAY FROM A CATASTROPHIC –"

Leather landed a blow just as Trench broke contact with the older man's cheek.

"-CATASTROPHE!" the Doctor whirled on the both of them, his anger a palpable, thick storm around him.

Both men blew apart, the force of their blows sending them carting off away in opposite directions. Panting, the men straightened, though Leather cupped his palms around his knees and Trench winced after every breath, tottering on the balls of his ill-tractioned feet. Amy looked upon the leather-clad man and saw his features distorted with his labored wrath; he looked positively gruesome with his dark countenance and blood running along his mouth in a trickling line from lip to chin where Trench's fist bruised and punctured the thin skin. Trench bent over in sudden pain, his fingers scrambling around his lung as his breathing raked out his throat. He spluttered and straightened, his face the mask of tempered pain, eye creased against the agony each inhale caused. Everyone stood so solemnly, so Amy took it upon herself to ask the biggest question here.

"Doctor, who are these men?"

"I told you," he said. "me, me, and me-me. We're all me."

"No, I've met other," she gestured to his figure wildly. "You's before. I've met your ganger and not-ganger and I've met future you and dream you's. I've met you in every way I could, Doctor."

"Not every way," but it wasn't the Doctor who spoke.

River walked forward and down the steps. She walked past Rory who brooded in his silence as the gears in his mind whirred, past Amy who still refused to grasp what was happening, and stepped around the Doctor who let her past.

"You are _so_ young," River stated emphatically, studying and mapping the brown eyes that were unlike any she had seen, yet so like the ones she had stared into as often as she could. "Aren't you?"

"He's the Doctor?" Amy's eyes widened as she watched River trace out the lines of the Trench coat. She turned to her Doctor, the only. "Tha's you, Doctor?"

He didn't meet her eyes but his turned smile was directed at her. "A past me, yes. Who you see before you is who I was before I regenerated." He nodded to his slender counter-part. "I know that look, do be careful of knocks – frightful things, Doctor, not ones you'd even think too."

The Doctor smirked with all the self-loathing and humility one could muster. This warning was more of an act of inner depreciation than of actual even transferring. What he said here, wouldn't help him when the time came.

The other Doctor grimaced and glared at his future self, those words having followed him from the Ood to ESP-inclined old ladies in London. Even Mars hadn't been without those words.

"Well I must say it is _good_ to finally meet you," River raised her hand, eyeing the younger Doctor lustily. There was a gleam in her eye that caused her Doctor to warn her on easing up. It only took her name and a sigh of compliance.

The other Doctor stared at the proffered hand as if it were dangerous. As if the hand would scald him. The Doctor realized, his eyes widening fractionally, that this would have been the second time seeing this woman – so soon after having just witnessed her death. It wasn't that long ago from his perspective that this woman had sacrificed herself for a man she would come to love but who hadn't yet.

"Uh, maybe another time, River –"

But their Doctor was cut short as the younger model gripped her hand tightly. River smiled and bounced over to the other, her wild curls fanning out behind her. Trench wrung his hand in the palm of the other, staring down at the appendage darkly.

"And you as well. My, but aren't you even _younger_!" she trilled, studying the Doctor even longer past as if he were a wild specimen she had found in the jungles.

The gruffer of the three glared down at her, nursing his jaw and wiping the blood off his lip with a vicious swipe of his thumb. Ignoring her hand, he called out to the others. "An' who are you lot, then?"

The Doctor twirled and pointed to Rory as he said, "Amy," and Amy as he said, "Rory."

"They're the Ponds-!" Rory heatedly whispered the correct name but went unregarded as usual.

Stepping forward though, Rory placed an arm around his Amy's shoulders and spoke up, exasperated, "_I'm_ Rory and _this_ is my lovely wife," his dry tone got him a light elbow to the rib. "Amy."

The Doctor nodded. "And this is River, my—" his lips froze as he quickly transitioned to, "_their _daughter."

His past self with the clearest blue eyes scoffed. "Oh you've gotta be joking me, seriously? Have I gone that daft down the line? I told everyone on board, I don't do families! No families – that was the rule, wasn't it? No families! An' what do I 'ave 'ere – a family!" He snorted once more and crossed his arms across his chest haughtily. "Domestics."

Amy rolled her eyes. "Cheery one, weren't you, Doctor?"

He made some non-committal sounds but could argue and defend himself no more than that, his face screwed up as he mocked her words.

"Anyway, Doctor," Rory turned his focus on the childish man, though acutely aware of the three heads that snapped up at him by the name. "You were saying something about 'catastrophic catastrophes'?"

He nodded. "Yes, yes, right too – alright you lot, here's the thing. It should be physically impossible for all three of us to be in one TARDIS because that would mean three time continuums roiling in one heart of one TARDIS all three of which are vying for dominance and waging an outright war on themselves," _Much like ourselves,_ he mentally added. "Now the desktop theme looks as if it's my TARDIS, but it very well could be yours or yours. Now our first question should be –"

"Why?" Rory piped in quickly.

"Good, but no, that isn't it," the Doctor admonished as he feverishly paced around the grid.

"It's what," the Leather Doctor said calmly. "_What_ is the cause of us not blowin' sky high right now when it should 'ave 'appened ages ago. What would have a power source high enough to stunt three warring TARDISes?"

"OH!" the sound tore from Trench's lips as his eyes bugged. The side of one hand connected with the flat of the other as an epiphany took him strongly. "It's not what – it _is_ why!"

Rory looked towards his Doctor triumphantly.

"But it's not just that, oh no, no, no! No! It's how! How, when, what, _and_ why! Don't you see? Why, of course, is a great question because why would they need us, _three_ Doctors. Obviously this is a large problem if it's going to take all three – though mind, if we're going to keep fighting we may as well bring in more of us or we'll be sure to cause a total time relapse by killin' each other off before it's time. But to the what, that's unclear, but this what has gotta be _ve-he-he-ery _powerful. How goes with what which leads us straight to when. This is the sort of power that would take billions – trillions! – of years to create so this must be from sometime in the future."

"So—"

"_Oh_, but don't you _see_! It's not from the future and it's not from the past, either. It's not just a simple time – it's all of time! All of time is calling out to us and what better place to get all of time than a TARDIS erupting to the second power of all things that ever was and ever were. Oh, this is _brilliant!_ Absolutely _brilliant!_ Something is calling to all of time, something is in _need_ of all-of-time an' we've just given it what it wants. Oh, this is a clever thing. This," Trench's head bobbed appreciatively at the plot he surmised in his head as if it were fine work from a carpenter. "This is _clever_."

"Wha's clever?" Amy and the Doctor in leather said in unison. He glared at her and she returned the favor.

"Oh, it's –"

The TARDIS screeched like steel grating steel and leather, tweed, cotton, and flannel went flying in all directions. She jerked her passengers around, spinning in gravity defying spins and flips, their stomachs matching the rotation of the décor. Amy and Rory's screams built in their throats as the rest tumbled with grunts and groans. At one point, the Doctor collided with Amy, sending her butting into Rory who knocked his head against Trench's shoulder who spun out and face-planted into River's breasts, peeling himself away quickly enough to hit Amy in the hip as a foot connected with Leather's thigh, grunting as it came painfully close to areas he'd rather leave untouched. The Doctor, unfortunately, was not saved from this as someone's foot thudded solidly against him. He yelped and was thrown into the rotors, an injury to his insult.

They tumbled like laundry in the machine, though the three Doctors were thankfully spared having collided with each other. One paradox was enough – no need to add more to it to that.

The sickening lurches and jerks, being tossed around like potatoes, only stopped when their faces pressed firmly into cool grass and thick leaves. A bamboo-esque stalk ripped Trench's pantleg and marred Rory's cheek. Jostling their heads, the crew picked themselves up on unsteady, shaking feet; the whole world tipping.

The TARDIS had spilled them out in an unknown realm of vines and trees with purple leaves the size of wardrobes. The air was musky with humidity and the scent of wet fur and rain. Their clothes already felt too hot for their climate and blood oozed from various wounds thick like molasses or Venutrusian honey. Rory mopped off his cheek with the sleeve of his shirt as Trench assessed the slash in his suit pants woefully.

"I loved these pants," he muttered piteously.

"Come off it," Leather groaned as he stood slowly, his joints creaking. That woman might have said he appeared young, but he certainly didn't feel it in the moment. "Jus' fix 'em up with the sonic an' you'll be fine, you big baby."

"I don't think we're in London anymore," Rory glanced around at the towering trees, too high for him to see past the searing-bright sun that scalded his eyes just to look.

"Oh," Leather began, sarcasm dripping like venom from fangs as it hung off each word. He patted the dust, dirt, and debris off himself as he smirked. "You don't say, Toto."

Amy moaned as she grabbed her head. "Oooooh…"

"Amy, Amy!" Rory ran and dropped to his knees in front of her. "Amy, Amy, how many fingers – Amy, Amy!"

"What?" she snaped, slapping his hand away from her face as it shook needlessly. "Three fingers, you dolt, now stop your fuss, geez – I'm fine."

Amy saw his cheek, scratch raw and pink around the serrated edge. Frowning, she gently applied pressure to the wound with her rolled down sleeve. Rory leant into the touch as she rolled it around his forehead to the wet line at his brow, already beginning to sweat from the heat.

"Wake up, my love, wake up – now is not the time to be napping," River chanted, smacking the Doctor on his cheek repeatedly. He had hit his head one too many times in the crash, but nothing River feared. She'd given him worse far more often times.

His eyes popped open as his breath inhaled with a snap. He sprung to his feet and charged for his TARDIS, his hearts leaping into his throat. He jimmied the door but to no avail. As a protocol, it had locked itself so no one within could be harmed, ejecting the passengers, it had full reign of itself.

The Doctor's hearts sank. They hit his stomach and fell lower still until his toes felt the dead weight of his emotions, too choking to even spit out. He wanted to retch.

"No no no no no, you can't do this – you _can't do this to me_," he whispered in anguish, slamming his palm against the wood peeling design. "NO YOU CAN'T DO THIS!" he screamed. "NO! I've only just got you back, you can't leave! I don't want you to go!"

Flashes of a biting woman with mad hair and a tattered dress assaulted him with every close of his eyes. The TARDIS is resolute in her silence and that is enough to heat the simmering flame within him. It stokes the burning, strokes the anger like a fond pet. This was the last straw.

Turning, his fury sends them all flinching as it spits and crackles behind him. Perhaps it was the TARDIS that did the crackling, but it was most definitely the Doctor who spat.

"THAT IS IT!" he shouted. "YOU! YOU! ALL OF YOU! We are sorting this out – RIGHT –"

But before his words can escape, the air is taken from his lungs, screeches echo shrilly in the air, and darkness takes hold.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Sorry for the delay! I have no other reason besides faulty computers I'm sorry! I should hopefully post more regularly than I do. **

**The next chapter has the Doctors paired off with people they might not think to enjoy their time with. They journey through the jungle staving off their frustration, and any enemy on the prowl, to find the source of what has led them to this place.**

**Stay tuned! :) **


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